How we scope and quote work
You get one fixed-price quote in writing before any work begins, and it does not move unless you change what you asked for. No hidden fees, no surprise invoices, and no long-term contracts.
We do not put a price list on this page, because any number we printed here would be a guess about your project made before anyone had looked at it. What we list instead is what actually makes a project cost more or less, so you can work out roughly where you land before you ever pick up the phone.
Get a fixed-price quoteWhat happens between "hello" and a number
Three steps, and you can stop after any of them.
A conversation
Twenty minutes about what you are trying to do and what is in your way. Free, and you will get a straight answer if the honest one is that you do not need us.
A written scope
We write down what is being built, what is explicitly not, and what we need from you. For software this is the paid discovery sprint, and the plan is yours whether or not we build it.
One fixed price
You see the number before the build begins. It changes only if you change the scope, and then you see the new number before that work starts too.
What actually drives the number
Four offerings, quoted four different ways, because they are not the same kind of work. Here is what moves each one.
Scope is settled before a price exists
Nobody can quote custom software from a phone call, and anyone who does is either guessing or padding. So we split it: a small paid discovery sprint to work out what you actually need, then one fixed price to build it. The discovery fee is credited toward the build.
- How many distinct jobs the system has to do
- Whether it needs accounts, roles, and permissions
- What it has to integrate with, and how well that system is documented
- Whether anything runs in the background or on a schedule
- Who operates it after launch, you or us
A one-time build plus a small annual fee
A website is quoted as a one-time build with a yearly fee for hosting, security updates, and minor content edits. We agree on both numbers before anything starts.
- How many pages you actually need, not how many a template has
- Whether you need a CMS to publish without calling us
- Forms, bookings, payments, and anything that has to talk to another system
- Whether you have copy and photos, or need help producing them
- The platform you want to be on afterwards
A flat monthly figure, month to month
Local SEO is quoted as a flat monthly figure with no minimum term. The plan you start on is the one you can leave, change, or pause.
- How large your service area is, which sets the geo-grid density we track at
- How many services need their own page to rank
- How competitive your map results already are
- Whether we are writing the content or you are
- How much cleanup the existing site needs before anything can rank
Management priced apart from your ad spend
Your ad budget is paid to Google, not to us, and we quote our management fee separately so you can always see which is which.
- How many campaigns and services you are advertising
- Whether conversion tracking already works, or has to be rebuilt first
- How wide the geography is and how many bid adjustments it needs
- Whether we are writing ad copy and landing-page recommendations
- How often you want the report and the review call
The fine print, made plain
- No long-term contracts. SEO and ad management are month-to-month; website support renews yearly with no obligation. If it stops working for you, we hand over the keys to your environment and wish you well.
- Every quote is fixed. We agree on the number before any work starts. It moves only when you change the scope, and then you see the new number first.
- Prepay and save. Pay for a year of an SEO plan up front and get 2 months free — an optional way to lock in a lower rate.
- You keep your domain, your content, and your published site. You also keep access to the environment it runs in. NS Media retains the raw source code behind the build; our terms state exactly what transfers and what does not.
- Third-party fees are separate. Hosted platforms bill their own monthly fee directly to you, and your Google Ads budget is paid to Google rather than to us. We quote our own work apart from both.
- The discovery fee is credited. If a paid discovery sprint leads to a build, its fee comes off the build price. If it does not, you keep the plan.
Questions about scope and cost
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